{"id":470630,"date":"2026-03-12T01:39:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T01:39:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/470630\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T01:39:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T01:39:13","slug":"to-confirm-he-is-doped-some-rely-on-his-bleached-blonde-hair-doctor-hits-back-at-bizarre-tadej-pogacar-theory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/470630\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cTo confirm he is doped, some rely on\u2026 his bleached blonde hair!\u201d \u2013 Doctor hits back at bizarre Tadej Pogacar theory"},"content":{"rendered":"


\nHowever, from a scientific perspective there is no evidence to support that suspicion. Speaking to Sports.fr in comments reported by A Bola<\/a>, sports doctor and doping specialist Jean-Pierre de Mondenard firmly rejected the idea.\u201cThe domination of Tadej Pogacar at Strade Bianche<\/a>, in the classics and in the Tour de France causes irritation among those who hate cycling. To confirm their certainty that he is doped, some rely on\u2026 his bleached blonde hair!\u201d the specialist said.<\/p>\n

Mondenard also pointed out that the dominance of the UAE Team Emirates \u2013 XRG leader did not begin recently. The Slovenian has been one of the leading figures in the international peloton for several years, long before appearing with his current platinum blonde hair. For the doctor, the coincidence between the change in appearance and his recent victories is simply irrelevant from a scientific standpoint.<\/p>\n

Why EPO cannot be detected through hair testing<\/p>\n

He also explained that the substance most commonly associated with doping in endurance sports, erythropoietin (EPO), cannot be detected through hair testing. \u201cEPO, the main doping product in endurance sports such as cycling, due to its size, cannot be detected by hair analysis.\u201d<\/p>\n

The specialist added that although chemical processes such as bleaching can reduce traces of some substances, including drugs like cocaine or opiates, those substances are rarely used to improve sporting performance. In any case, they are easily detected through far more common anti-doping methods such as blood and urine tests, which remain the basis of most controls in professional cycling.<\/p>\n

Pogacar\u2019s Eminem tribute behind the blonde hair<\/p>\n

To illustrate how weak the suspicion surrounding Pogacar\u2019s hair is, Mondenard pointed to an example from another sport. \u201cFootballer Antoine Griezmann has played for years with fluorescent pink hair. Curiously, nobody sees that as an indication of doping\u2026 even though football is not free from the medicalisation of performance,\u201d he said, referring to the Atletico Madrid and France international.<\/p>\n

Pogacar himself has already explained the reason for the change in appearance. According to the rider, the blonde hair is not linked to cycling\u2019s past or to any former riders. Instead, it is simply a tribute to rapper Eminem, an artist he has said he greatly admires.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" However, from a scientific perspective there is no evidence to support that suspicion. Speaking to Sports.fr in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466600,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,105193,101,119131,8782,12183,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-470630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-doping","tag-sports","tag-strade-bianche","tag-tadej-pogacar","tag-uae-team-emirates-xrg","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=470630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470630\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/466600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=470630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=470630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=470630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}